%0 Journal Article
%T Identification of Licopyranocoumarin and Glycyrurol from Herbal Medicines as Neuroprotective Compounds for Parkinson's Disease
%A Takahiro Fujimaki
%A Shinji Saiki
%A Etsu Tashiro
%A Daisuke Yamada
%A Mitsuhiro Kitagawa
%A Nobutaka Hattori
%A Masaya Imoto
%J PLOS ONE
%D 2014
%I Public Library of Science (PLoS)
%R 10.1371/journal.pone.0100395
%X In the course of screening for the anti-Parkinsonian drugs from a library of traditional herbal medicines, we found that the extracts of choi-joki-to and daio-kanzo-to protected cells from MPP+-induced cell death. Because choi-joki-to and daio-kanzo-to commonly contain the genus Glycyrrhiza, we isolated licopyranocoumarin (LPC) and glycyrurol (GCR) as potent neuroprotective principals from Glycyrrhiza. LPC and GCR markedly blocked MPP+-induced neuronal PC12D cell death and disappearance of mitochondrial membrane potential, which were mediated by JNK. LPC and GCR inhibited MPP+-induced JNK activation through the suppression of reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation, thereby inhibiting MPP+-induced neuronal PC12D cell death. These results indicated that LPC and GCR derived from choi-joki-to and daio-kanzo-to would be promising drug leads for PD treatment in the future.
%U http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0100395